Nation news briefs

HAWAII TELESCOPE SEES WHAT COULD BE OLDEST GALAXY: HONOLULU (AP) — A team of Japanese astronomers using telescopes on Hawaii say they've seen the oldest galaxy, a discovery that's competing with other "earliest galaxy" claims.

The Japanese team calculates its galaxy was formed 12.91 billion light-years ago, and their research will be published in the Astrophysical Journal. The scientists with the National Astronomical Observatory of Japan used the Subaru and Keck telescopes on the summit of Mauna Kea.

A light-year is the distance that light travels in a year, about 6 trillion miles. Seeing distant galaxies is akin to looking back into time.

Richard Ellis of the California Institute of Technology, an influential expert in cosmology and galaxy formation, said the latest work as more convincing than some other galaxy discoveries.

He said the Japanese claim is more "watertight," using methods that everyone can agree on. But he said it's not much of a change from a similar finding by the same team last year.

PA. SCHOOL UNION WINS 'RIGHT' TO EAT EXPIRED FOOD: SHARPSVILLE, Pa. (AP) — Unionized cafeteria workers in one western Pennsylvania school district have won the right to eat expired food for free — at their own risk.

The Herald of Sharon, Pa., reports Monday that the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees filed a grievance against the Sharpsville Area School District last year after school officials "violated established past practice" by no longer allowing workers to eat the expired food for free.

The newspaper got a copy of a settlement approved by the school board last month.

Under the agreement, food items that are past their expiration date or reheated in a way that they can no longer be served to students may still be eaten for free by the cafeteria workers.

Workers must pay for unexpired food they eat.

POLICE: DRUNK MAN FELL ASLEEP IN WRONG NY HOUSE: NEWSTEAD, N.Y. (AP) — Authorities in western New York say a 20-year-old man thought he was sleeping on his friend's couch when state troopers woke him up over the weekend.

It turns out he was off by about 20 miles.

State police say a homeowner in rural Erie County town of Newstead woke up around 4:30 a.m. Saturday and found a stranger sleeping on his couch. He was unable to wake up the stranger, so his wife called 911. When troopers arrived, they found the very intoxicated man still sleeping on the couch.

Troopers say the man told him he thought he was at a friend's house on Grand Island, 20 miles west of Newstead.

The man was charged with criminal trespass and issued an appearance ticket for Newstead Town Court.

WORD MISSPELLED ON NEVADA HIGH SCHOOL'S DIPLOMAS: SPRING CREEK, Nev. (AP) — Students at a northeastern Nevada high school were surprised when they received their diplomas: the word "graduation" was misspelled as "graduataion."

Spring Creek High Principal Keith Walz told the Elko Daily Free Press (http://bit.ly/KHySBs ) that the misspelling on about 200 diplomas ordered from the Salt Lake City company Jostens was an "inadvertent mistake."

Jostens spokesman Bryan Durfey acknowledges the company was responsible for the mistake, and says corrected diplomas already have been sent by priority mail directly to graduates.

He says the company realizes it isn't going to be perfect, and its policy is to fix errors immediately.

The school will not be charged for the extra diplomas.

In a similar incident, diplomas at a Maryland high school are being reprinted because they contained a misspelling of the word "program."